Sawtooth Elementary holds Stone Soup Harvest celebration

Betsy Jorgenson

Hard-working gloriously happy kindergartners help shell peas. From left are Elizabeth DeWitt, Ruby Hawsen, Kian Orest, and Aitan Seim.
Photos courtesy of Sawtooth Elementary staff If you walked down the halls of Sawtooth Mountain Elementary School last Friday you were treated to the rich aroma of warm soup wafting out of each classroom.

Last week students in grades P-K celebrated the arrival of autumn and the harvest season by gathering vegetables from the school garden and preparing soup in slow cookers in each classroom.

The garden was developed by the work of Alex Ditmanson as an Eagle Scout project and by the generous time and expertise of local master gardeners Max Linehan, Janet Ditmanson and Duane Hasegawa.

Every spring SME students start seeds indoors under grow lights that line the hallways. During the final weeks of school small plants are transferred outdoors and other seeds are planted directly in the garden beds.

Top: Kwinn Anderson looks up as her fellow classmates harvest potatoes. Above: Pea shuckers extraordinaire are, from left, Karis Ford, RosaBella Arrellin and Miles Ekstrom. Left: Kallie Anderson, 4th grade, helps prepare stone soup. Over the summer many Sawtooth Mountain Elementary families volunteered their time and adopted the garden for a week thinning, weeding and watering the garden as needed.

When school starts up in September students are welcomed back by towering sunflowers, squash, and pumpkins, kale and chard, sugar snap peas, beans, grape tomatoes and carrots as well as a flowering pollinator garden and ripening apples dangling from the garden trees.

By the time the autumnal equinox arrives the food crops are ready to be harvested.

Throughout the harvest week students participate in cross-curricular learning events and share harvested crops with other classrooms in anticipation of the special day. Many students enjoy helping prepare vegetables for soup but the best part is tasting the fruits of the school community’s efforts.